Chopin: Cello Transcriptions

Part of Chopin's last public performance, the Cello Sonata was given in 1847 at the Salle Pleyel, named after the instrument makers. Here Edna Stern plays an 1843 Pleyel grand piano, in a lyrical program that also includes arrangements of Prelude in A Minor, Op. 28, No. 2; Nocturne in G Major, Op. 37, No. 2; Prelude in E Minor, Op. 28, No. 4; Nocturne in G Minor, Op. 37, No. 1; Introduction and Polonaise brillante in C Major, Op. 3; Nocturne in E Minor, Op. 72, No. 1; and Waltz in A Minor, KK Ivb, No. 11.

"The Pleyel grand helps even more to emphasize the balance Chopin achieved in the Sonata. The two instruments seem perfectly matched, both creating a sound that's burnished, with a dusky sort of sheen…. Plus the playing itself is very fine—secure but daring when it needs to be, attuned to the several competing moods in this music, whether brooding, impassioned, or carefree, as in some of the earlier pieces on the program."—Audiophile Audition